I just read an article this morning online about a group teens in Oklahoma who randomly shot and killed an Australian collage student and claim they did it "for the fun of it". All I can think of is, what is wrong with these kids?

The Preacher Ecclesiastes 1:1 to 12:1 1:1 The words of the preacher, the son of King David in Jerusalem.
Everything is nothing, absolutely nothing. Everything is absolutely nothing. People live and people die but the Earth just keeps on keeping on. The sun rises and the sun sets.…

God and Job Job 19:1 to 42:10 19:1 Both God and Satan remained quiet while Job and his three friends continued debating the system of justice God had provided for the Universe. Job said, "Give me a break, I'm innocent. I've begged God to hear my story but he's shut me out. He has unfairly counted me among his enemies. He has…

Job's Friends Job 8:1 to 18:1 8:1 After Job's extensive tirade about the unjust nature of humanity's role in the battle between cosmic factions of good and evil, his number two friend had finally heard enough and entered the fray. He said "How long can you go on and on about what a good guy you are? If…

Testing Job Job 1:1 to 6:4 1:1 Once upon a time there was a rich man in the land of Uz whose name was Job. He was indeed one righteous dude. He was very afraid of the Lord, which is wise, and also he hated evil. So that was essentially Job’s stand on the subject of human morality, fear and hate. He had a…

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On September 19 2011, the Telegraph website published an article titled "Atheism is cool, says Archbishop Rowan Williams". In the article the Archbishop claims the apparent rise in atheism due to it's "cool" factor, and that refutations of authors such as Richard Dawkins don't get the attention they "deserve" because atheism is the latest fad, not…

Most of the time when I watch "real haunting" shows, I do so because either 1. someone else turned it on and I'm too lazy to leave the room or procrastinating or 2. I go looking for logical fallacies and things to laugh at.

But... do you know what I don't find funny about those shows? Exorcisms! Why do these people call exorcists? Usually it seems to be because their family member is acting strangely in a destructive way and their religious beliefs tell them that the most…

It was pointed out to me in a comment this morning about Bertand Russell's Teapot, that theists dismiss the ideas of Santa Claus and The Celestial Teapot outright because of the silliness of the ideas and the incredible unlikeliness that they exist, but fail to see their own shortcomings in judgement about their belief in god or Gods along the same premise. I see why this is, after all,…Continue

"If a man is offered a fact which goes against his instincts, he will scrutinize it closely, and unless the evidence is overwhelming, he will refuse to believe it. If, on the other hand, he is offered something which affords a reason for acting in accordance to his instincts, he will accept it even on the slightest evidence. The origin of myths is explained in this way." - Bertrand…

What are some of the things in your life that make you happy? What are the greatest joys in your life? What gives you the greatest sense of achievement, and what are the moments in your life that you remember as the most important ones? Does religion play a part in any of these moments, feelings or personal possessions? Because according to many religious folk, the greatest thing in their life is their faith in God. This troubles me.

The power of religion lies in the power of fear; fear of death, fear of the unknown, fear of people who are different, fear of God, and the fear that a lifetime of belief may in fact be wrong. Many religious folks might deny the last point, but I'll get to what I mean by that in a minute.

All people fear dying, but not all fear being dead. As Mark Twain is famous… Continue

Added by Martin Pribble on September 13, 2011 at 11:45pm —
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I originally posted this at my blog Martin S Pribble, and it was subsequently picked up as an "Article" at RDFRS, which made me quite happy. It has caused quite a discussion at both sites, so I thought it would be good to share with you lot also.

Religion is running scared from advances in science, particularly brain science such as neurology. Why? Because the brain is the final frontier in uncovering the reasons for belief in superstitions, religion and a higher…

“It is not something that happens because people miss-interpret the text; it is because they believe in them. That is the problem.”~ Christopher Hitchens ~

Somehow stories contain the very soul of a people; when, for instance, American pastor Carol M. Noren meditated on the crossing of the Read Sea, saying that “God commands Moses to stretch out his hand over the sea,” and Moses obeys without hesitation, she infers the conclusion that, “Our Lord desires…

As you know, I believe education is the key to beginning to solve all of the woes we have in society today. Yes all of them. From world hunger to population, from wars to disease, from terrorism to the production of clean and renewable energy. Each of these can be solved if we educate the people who are directly effected by them, and those who go into areas to help. In fact I can't think of one situation that cannot be made better without education, at least in the long term. Education should… Continue

I'm currently reading "The Mothman Prophesies" by John A. Keel. [I know... you can laugh at me]. I chose to read it because despite my being an atheist who is an extreme skeptic of anything supernatural... I haven't lost my taste for a good spooky tale. Being the thrill-chaser that I am, I enjoy all sorts of things that give a good scare... horror movies, rollar coasters, ghost stories, urban legends... and [as I apparently found out last Monday] scaling the side of a 15-foot [~4.6 m] rocky…

It’s time for me to renew my license plates. Luckily, I received a card in the mail with a PIN number, License Plate Number, and some other information I would need to renew them online. Given the many wasted hours spent waiting in line at the DMV over the years, I was grateful for this new alternative.

So, I went to log into the site with the information provided. I was asked for my PIN and plate number (changed). The PIN Number was completely new to me, but I was pretty confident I… Continue

In the April 7, 2011 debate between Sam Harris and William Lane Craig regarding whether or not objective morality is possible without god, Craig refused to accept that an objective morality of this type is possible; in fact, he said that if there were no god, objective morality would be impossible. He believes this to such an extent that he believes the use of the terms moral or morality must be reserved to those actions based on belief in and adherence to a god – specifically, the god of the… Continue